I love a good Macaroni and Cheese. The problem is, like potato salad, I am very particular about my Mac & Cheese. I like it creamy, but not soupy or goopy. It should be thick enough to stand up a fork in it, but not gritty or grainy. It's not easy to find a recipe that lives up to my expectations, but here's one that I finally found that is just amazing.

The best recipe for Macaroni and Cheese that I've made so far is the one recently published in Cook's Country Magazine (in the April/May 2007 issue). The texture is simply amazing - smooth but not runny, cheesy but without clumping or separating.

The recipe is more complicated than most, but in order to achieve the ultimate mac & cheese, that's what it takes. The recipe utilizes three different cheeses: American cheese (for stability - American cheese has stabilizing ingredients), Monterey Jack cheese (for creaminess), and sharp cheddar (for flavor). (A fourth cheese is actually used - Parmesan - to flavor the bread crumb topping!) To keep the cheeses from breaking, evaporated milk (which contains carrageen or other stabilizing ingredients) is used instead of milk or cream.

Bring four quarts of water to a hard boil. Dissolve at least 1 Tbs. (18 g) table salt into the water and add the macaroni. Cook until al dente (when the macaroni no longer shows white in center of the pasta when you bite into it but still has chew). Check the instructions on the package of your macaroni product and use the time listed as a guide. I generally start checking the macaroni a minute or two early to make sure I don't over cook it.

Once it's ready, ladle out 1/2 cup water to be reserved for the cheese sauce later. Immediately drain the macaroni and rinse it thoroughly in cold water to stop the cooking. This is one of the few times I advocate using a colander and rinsing pasta with cold water (in most cases, pasta used in casseroles benefits from this procedure).

Break the sandwich bread into chunks and pulse in a food processor with 4 Tbs. of melted butter and the Parmesan cheese until bread crumbs are formed. Set aside in a bowl for topping the casserole later.

Shred the American, Monterey Jack, and cheddar cheeses. I found this was done fastest by using the grating disc on my food processor.

Prepare a roux by heating (over medium heat) 4 Tbs. butter until it foams. Then stir in the flour and cook while stirring until light brown (about 1 minute).

Slowly add evaporated milk while stirring until all the evaporated milk has been added to the pot and no clumps of roux remain. Stir in the hot sauce, nutmeg, mustard, and salt.

Cook the mixture for about 4 more minutes on medium heat. The mixture (a béchamel sauce) should have thickened up.

Move the pot off the heat source and stir in the grated cheeses and 1/2 cup reserve water. Keep stirring until the cheese completely melts into the bechamel.

Stir in the cooked macaroni so that the sauce completely coats all the pasta.

Pour the macaroni and cheese into a 9x13-in. baking pan.

Cover the top of the macaroni and cheese with the bread crumb mixture.

Bake for 25 minutes (when the edges begin to bubble). Remove from the oven and let the casserole sit for 5 to 10 minutes before cutting into it to serve.

I think it actually might be immoral to produce these. I've never done it myself, but I'd sure like to know if you've tried it and if it was good. I think it would take a very well-done mac and cheese to stand up to being fried into wedges.

wisk together and pour between several layers of macaroni and slices of 1 lb ea. pepper jack and sharp chedder. Bake at 350 for 30 min or until it starts to bubble. Warm gooey and o so satifsying! I like it best with ketchup!

American cheese is this coagulated milk based stuff. Here's an example: http://tinyurl.com/23y6wa You might try looking at some sliced cheese at an Aldi-like supermarket. In my experience, if it's real cheese, it doesn't have a list of ingredients.

I think the consistency of the finished product is dependant on so many things: the flour, the water content of the milk, the water content of the cheese, the time in the oven, etc., so it would surprise me if the chemically goodness of the American cheese really is what gave the right consistency.

Have you had the opportunity to quantitate the nutritional content per serving of your most fabulous sounding dish? I'm interested in the caloric/protein/carb/fat content. My guess is, it more than likely puts it way off the list of possibilities. Oh to dream...

Ever tried the mac and cheese at The Cheesecake Factory? It is about the BEST stuff I have ever had. I know they use parmesan in it as I can taste it. I am with you for consistency, though. I like it smooth but not runny nor grainy. Flavor is also important. Anyway, I was wondering if you tried the stuff at The Cheesecake Factory and how it compared?

Regarding fried mac and cheese, yeah, I think that is a sin. Hahaha, I don't want to imagine what result that has on the bad cholesteral meter. Thinking about it makes my heart start constricting at the moment! OUCH!

I've had fried mac and chz, and its definitely something to experience at least once. I'm not saying its the healthiest, but come on...read the name again...did you think it would be? I've also had Mac and Chz pizza. That was sinful. I heard that CiCi's had some, but there are no locations here, so I asked some questions about it, and built my own with homemade mac n chz. So good.

I will add that my mother made everything from scratch. My husband had never had homemade mac and chz before me. What?! He's a convert. Though he still likes his Kraft.

it is usually called "Processed cheese" "Processed cheese slices" or just "cheese slices", or kind of like we refer to tissues as "Kleenex", we also refer to it as "Kraft slices" occasionally. Sometimes the slices are labelled "Cheese Product" too, because it is not really REAL cheese.

I am in Canada and no one has ever referred to it as American because that word is not on any of the packages, although they are identical otherwise. Strange that the word is added to the packages sold in the United States. I believe that American refers to the STYLE of the cheese - processing it into one-at-a-time slices. I think it was their idea to do this. (Of course, there is no such actual cheese as "American", like Gouda, Cheddar, etc.)